Polyolefins are important items of commerce, many thousands of tons being produced annually. They are useful in many applications depending upon their particular properties, for instance as molding resins, fibers, films useful in packaging and/or electronics, elastomers, and many others. There are many known polymerization processes for producing polyolefins, but given the importance of these polymers, improved processes are constantly being sought.
L. K. Johnson, et. al., J. Am. Chem. Soc., vol. 117, p. 6414-6415 (1995), and L. K. Johnson, et al., J. Am. Chem. Soc., vol. 118, p. 267-268 (1996) describe the polymerization of olefins using certain .alpha.-diimine complexes. Neither of these references describes a polymerization process using the starting materials described herein.